System, apparatus and method for dynamically adjusting a video presentation based upon age

ABSTRACT

A system, method and apparatus are set forth which adjusts one or more of the brightness, vibrancy and color shift of displayed content based upon the at least approximate age of the viewer. At a display ( 15 ) the user&#39;s age is at least approximated by accessing an established user data file ( 835, 837 ) containing age determining data and/or capturing a facial image ( 804 ) of the user and processing the same to determine at least the approximate age of the user. Based upon the age determination the brightness, vibrancy and/or color shift may be adjusted to account for the effects of the aging of the human eye. User overrides ( 900, 902, 904 ) may be provided for the user to alter or turn off the adjustments. Adjustment of the brightness, vibrancy and/or color shift may also take into account ambient light conditions.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains materialthat is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has noobjection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent documentor the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent and TrademarkOffice patent files or records, but otherwise reserves all copyrightrights whatsoever.

BACKGROUND OF THE DISCLOSURE

1. Field of the Disclosure

This disclosure relates to dynamic adjustment of a video presentationsuch as one or more of field of the disclosure relates to apparatus,systems, methods and application for controlling one or more of thebrightness, vibrancy, color temperature and/or color shift based upon atleast an estimated age of the viewer.

2. Description of the Related Art

Human beings do not perceive color in a uniform way. Porkony et al.,“Aging of the Human Lens”, Applied Optics, Vol. 26, No. 8, 15 Apr. 1987(http://macboy.uchicago.edu/˜eye1/PDF%20files/Pokorny.et.al.%20lens.pdf)describe how the human eye lens increases in density as we get older,and because the lens thereby absorbs more strongly in the UV andshort-wavelength region, this leads to less discrimination between blueand green colors. Other researchers such as Schieber, “Human Factors andAging: Identifying and Compensating for Age-related Deficits in Sensoryand Cognitive Function”, Heimstra Human Factors Laboratories, Departmentof Psychology, University of South Dakota, 415 E. Clark Street,Vermillion, S. Dak. 57069, Mar. 15, 2002 (FINAL DRAFT)(http://people.usd.edu/˜schieber/psyc423/pdf/human-factors.pdf), morerecently, have attributed this “red shift” phenomenon to a greater lossof sensitivity of shorter wavelengths at photoreceptors (cones) in theretina.

Berman, “The Re-engineering of Lighting Photometry”, Energy andEnvironment Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, BerkeleyCalif. 94720, July 1995, LBNL-42327, L-213(http://gaia.lbl.gov/btech/papers/42327.pdf) describes how perception ofbrightness, and thus smaller pupil size (leading to better resolution ofcontrast, depth of field and acuity) can be improved by increasing thecolor temperature of illumination. By color temperature what is meant isthe temperature of an ideal black body that radiates light of acomparable hue.

Technologies currently exist to adjust the perception of color on avideo display. One such example is produced by eeColor, St. AugustineFla. (http://www.eecolor.com/). eeColor's technology works by usingpixel “shaders” present in a graphics processing unit (GPU) to remap thecolors being displayed. This remapping occurs for every image as it isdisplayed on the LCD monitor. eeColor's algorithms, presumably basedupon look-up-tables or transformation matrices, increase the perceivedvibrancy of an image. One way this may be achieved would be to map thered-green-blue (RGB) colors of each pixel into HSV (Hue SaturationValue), and then increase the S (Saturation) component by a nonlinearfactor such that high saturation values are not increased much, if atall.

The effect to a user of an eeColor modified display is of an image withbetter vibrancy, but with no perceived change to brightness.

The eeColor technology suffers from several drawbacks. For video contentwhich is intended for extended viewing such as video games, movies,casino style games (whether played on a pay-to-play (P2P) basis or forpurely entertainment purposes), designers, post-processors and editorsdesign the graphics for such extended view. Applying the eeColorsolution may have a detrimental effect on the content by adjusting whathas been finely tuned by experienced designers and editors. As statedabove, this is particularly true for casino-style video games where aplayer may play for one or several hours. Further the adjustment doesnot take into account human eye perception performance as related to theviewer's age. However, an approach such as suggested by eeColor may haveadvantages if selectively deployed such as where there are multipleviewers or for short term viewing such as when a casino game in an“attract mode” showing graphic content to attract a player.

In a heretofore unrelated technology there has been developed technologyfor passively detecting biometric features of a human such as facialfeatures and from that estimating the viewer's age. For exampleFraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, Am Wolfsmantel 33, 91058,Erlangen, Germany, has developed software named SHORE™ from which theage of a subject can be estimated based upon a captured image of thesubject's face. This technology is touted as being able to estimate theage with a mean absolute error of 6.85 years.

In certain enterprises a user, customer or patron's age can be directlyobtained. As but an example, in a casino enterprise, a player may enrollin a player loyalty program of the type described in Boushy, U.S. Pat.No. 7,419,427 issued Sep. 2, 2008 and titled “National CustomerRecognition System and Method”, the disclosure of which is incorporatedby reference. Bally Gaming, Inc. d/b/a Bally Technologies manufactures,sells, installs and maintains such systems currently as its ACSC-CMSsystem. Enrollment in the loyalty program actively obtains the player'sage though the application and enrollment process or by the playerproviding an identification document such as a driver's licenseproviding a date of birth from which the player's current age can bedetermined. Other “active” enrollment processes which obtain age dataare credit card applications, and other loyalty programs such as airlinefrequent flyer programs. These programs and facilities result in adatabase storing user/player data including data indicative of theuser/player's age which can be accessed.

In one aspect there is a need for video displays and graphic and videoprocessing units to be able to, based upon a viewer's or user's age toadjust certain video perceptions as viewed by the user to account forthe aforesaid typical “red shift” for older people to better present thecontent to the user. In this regard there is a need to be able to obtainage data for the viewer, either passively of actively.

There is a need in such an approach to provide one or more defaultsettings which can be applied where age cannot be determined or in otherinstances such as an advertising or attract mode.

There is a need to provide such solutions not only in the casino andon-line gaming environment but in other environments where graphic andvideo content is presented particularly over extended periods of time orwhere there is a desire to adjust the presentation brightness, vibrancy,color temperature and/or color shift based upon the viewer's age.

There is a need to provide video displays and graphic and videoprocessing units to be able to, based upon one or more of a viewer's oruser's age or viewer's age associated with the content demographic toadjust certain video perceptions as viewed by the user to account forthe aforesaid typical “red shift” for older people to better present thecontent to the user.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

In one aspect of the present disclosure there is provided according toembodiments of the present disclosure an apparatus, method and systemfor adjusting one or more video or graphic presentation parameters ofbrightness, vibrancy, color temperature and/or color shift forvideo/graphic content based at least in part upon an assessment of theviewer's age. The user's age can be passively determined as from anacquired facial image of the viewer and processing the same to make anage range assessment. Age can also be determined by accessing one ormore databases where the user has provided age data such as a loyaltyprogram or credit card database or by requesting the user to enter theirage or date of birth or select an age range. Age or age groupings canalso be at least estimated or suggested based upon a demographic of alikely viewer of the content. That is, where the content is more likelyto be viewed by older viewers, the adjustment may be applied. Also,vibrancy technology can thus be used to facilitate long-term play, andto better discern gaming or other content.

In an embodiment the apparatus, method, system application includes afacility which acquires data corresponding to or from which at least anapproximate age of the user can be determined. This data is provided toa processor. Based upon the age data from the facility the processoradjusts one or more of the brightness, color temperature, vibrancy andcolor shift for the displayed images. For example, if it is determinedthat the user is over middle age, the processor may adjust brightness,color temperature and vibrancy and shift the color of at least one ormore portions of the video graphics to, for example, enhance thevibrancy of the blue and green colors to overcome the tendency of agedhuman eye lenses to absorb the UV and short-wavelengths which leads toless discrimination between blue and green colors. Additionally or apartfrom enhancing the vibrancy of the green and blue colors, a color shiftmay be applied to shift those colors more toward the red end of thecolor spectrum.

In a specific embodiment for a gaming enterprise such as a casino,gaming devices are equipped with a digital camera to capture a biometricfeature of a player such as their face or a portion thereof, e.g. theeyes or the area around the eyes. Capturing of a facial image of aplayer is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/311,000 filedDec. 5, 2011 and titled “A Gaming System, Method and device forGenerating Images Having a Parallax Effect Using Face Tracking” assignedto the assignee of the present disclosure and the disclosure of which ishereby incorporated by reference. Using the biometric feature and aprocessor controlled by software the age of a player setting at thegaming machine can be estimated. In the event the player inserts theirloyalty card at the gaming device, the processor can access the player'saccount to determine the player's age. Both approaches may be used inthe event the player is using a relative's or friend's loyalty card.Software, where both the acquisition of a biometric feature and aloyalty card are used to determine an actual age and there is a conflictwould be subject to a predetermined resolution such as relying upon thebiometric approach. Based upon the estimated or determined age of theplayer a graphics processing unit would apply one or more of brightness,vibrancy, color temperature and color shift to the graphics and videopresented to the player. In an embodiment the player may have the optionto “turn off” the enhancement or using an input device to modify theadjustment, within limits, to their liking.

Thus, in one approach the disclosure can be implemented in an Alpha 2cabinet including a digital webcam or other camera connected by a USB toan Alpha 2 suitcase. There can be further provided a Nvidia Pixelshading 2.0 or better capable GPU. Moreover, in a specific approach, anOpen CL or equivalent programming may be employed for programming pixelshapers of a GPU and demographic or facial detection technology such asFraunhofer SHORE can be utilized.

In an embodiment a downloadable software application may be provided toa video device for controlling the features in a manner described above.The application may access a device-internal or an external database toacquire at least approximate age data or the user may be prompted toenter such data. Based upon the determined at least approximate age theapplication may control the device video display one or more ofbrightness, vibrancy, color temperature and color shift to the graphicsand video presented to the user. The application may also include datafor default configurations of brightness, vibrancy, color temperatureand color shift and conditions wherein a default configuration is to beapplied.

In a further embodiment a facility may be provided to determine ambientlight conditions for the video display and control the device videodisplay one or more of brightness, vibrancy, color temperature and colorshift to the graphics and video presented to the user. The control maytake into account both the age as well as ambient light conditionsaccording to one or more control protocols. User inputs may also controlone or more of brightness, vibrancy, color temperature and color shift.Further, vibrancy enhanced color can be provided for only certain orselected states of operation. Moreover, there is contemplated aninterpretation of adjustments for one or more applications of thedisclosure to make adjustments less perceptible.

Other features and numerous advantages of the various embodiments willbecome apparent from the following detailed description when viewed inconjunction with the corresponding drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates a gaming terminal;

FIG. 2A illustrates an example of a gaming terminal operational platformand components for a gaming terminal of the type of the presentdisclosure;

FIG. 2B illustrates an example of a gaming terminal operational platformand components for a gaming terminal of the type of the presentdisclosure;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of the logical components of a gaming kernelfor a gaming terminal.

FIG. 4A is a schematic of an example of a casino enterprise networkincorporating gaming terminals;

FIG. 4B is a schematic of an example of a casino enterprise networkincorporating gaming terminals;

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of an architecture for tying acasino enterprise network to an external provider of games and contentto Internet or broadband communication capable devices;

FIG. 6 is a process diagram showing the operation of an embodiment ofthe disclosure for a player of a gaming device;

FIG. 7 is a process diagram for an embodiment of the disclosure whichtakes into account ambient lighting conditions;

FIG. 8 illustrates an embodiment of the disclosure for use outside ofgaming and for mobile devices; and

FIG. 9 illustrates a video display including touch screen slide buttonsfor user input.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

The following description is primary directed to an implementation ofthe present disclosure in a gaming environment. However it should beunderstood that the present disclosure has applications outside ofgaming such as in the delivery of video (video, graphic and animations)to display devices such as televisions, personal computer monitors anddisplays, kiosks, smart phones, cellular phones, laptop computers,tablet computers, display glasses, electronic table displays andelectronic table games and the like.

Referring now to the drawings, wherein like reference numbers denotelike or corresponding elements throughout the drawings, and moreparticularly referring to FIG. 1, a gaming device 10 according to one ormore embodiments of the present disclosure is shown. The gaming device10 includes cabinet 12 providing an enclosure for the several componentsof the gaming device 10 and associated equipment. A primary game display14 is mounted to the cabinet 12. The primary game display 14 may be avideo display such as an LCD, plasma, OLED or other electronic displayor it may be an electro-mechanical display such as electro-mechanicalstepper reels as are known in the art combined with video display unitssuch as overlays or adjacent video displays of the type described above.The primary game display 14 may also be embodied as a combination of twoor more electronic or mechanical displays disposed in an adjacentoverlapping or overlying arrangement. The primary game display 14 may bemounted to one or more of a door for the cabinet 12 or the cabinetchassis itself. The primary game display 14 is located to display gamecontent (and if desired other content) to the player. For example, thegame content may be game outcomes presented by a plurality of video orelectro-mechanical reels displaying symbols the combinations of whichdefine winning or losing outcomes, video Poker, Keno or other form ofbase casino wagering game as is known in the art. Where the primary gamedisplay 14 is a video display, features such as bonus/feature games mayalso be presented. The foregoing description should not be deemed aslimiting the content (graphics, video or text) which can be displayed atthe primary game display 14. The cabinet 12 may comprise a slant-top,bar-top, or table-top style cabinet as is known in the art.

The gaming device 10 also includes in one or more embodiments a top box16 which may support a printed back-lit glass (not shown) as is known inthe art depicting the rules, award schedule, attract graphics or it maysupport a secondary game display 18 which may be of one of the typesdescribed above with reference to the primary game display 14. The topbox 16 may also support a backlit glass with graphics defining a marquee19 and a topper 21 including additional graphics.

To enable a player to provide input to the controller for the gamingdevice 10 a plurality of buttons 20 may be provided on a button deck forthe gaming device 10. Additionally and alternatively one or both of theprimary and secondary game displays 14, 18 may include touch screeninput devices as are known in the art. Buttons, selections or inputs aredisplayed at the primary and secondary game displays 14, 18 and theplayer touching those icons or designated areas provides the required ordesired input to configure and play the gaming device 10.

Other peripherals or associated equipment for the gaming device 10include a bill/voucher acceptor 24 which reads and validates currencyand vouchers for the player to establish credits for gaming on thegaming device 10 and one or more speakers 26 to provide audio to theplayer in association with the game play. To provide for communicationbetween the gaming device 10 and a casino system, a player trackingmodule (PTM) 28 is mounted on the cabinet 12. PTM 28 has a PTM display30 to display system related information to the player. The PTM display30 may be a small LCD, plasma or OLED display with touch screenfunctionality. The mystery bonus game presentation(s) are displayed atthe PTM display 30; however, as set forth below these presentations canbe migrated to the primary or secondary displays 14, 18. A card reader32 is provided to read a machine readable component on a player loyaltycard issued to the player to identify the player to the casino system asin known in the art. A ticket printer 36 may be provided as well on thePTM 28 or elsewhere on the gaming device 10 to provide printed valueticket vouchers to players as is known in the art.

Some functionality of the PTM 28 may be provided by a video switcher andtouch router device as is described in U.S. Pub. App. 2009/0149253entitled “Video Switcher and Touch Router Method for a Gaming Machine”filed Jan. 8, 2009 and incorporated by reference. According to thisdisclosure system and externally based content including the mysterygame presentations as hereinafter described may be displayed at one ormore of the primary or secondary displays 14, 18 dispensing with theneed for the PTM display 30.

While the player may use the buttons 20 to prompt play of the game (orthe touch screen input), alternatively the player may use a handle 34,voice recognized commands, player gestures and eye movement to prompt aninput as is known in the art.

Cabinet 12 may be a self-standing unit that is generally rectangular inshape and may be manufactured with reinforced steel or other rigidmaterials which are resistant to tampering and vandalism. Any shapedcabinet may be implemented with any embodiment of gaming machine 10 solong as it provides access to a player for playing a game. For example,cabinet 12 may comprise a slant-top, bar-top, or table-top stylecabinet, including a Bally Cinevision™ or CineReels™ cabinet. The gamingdevice 10 may include a controller and memory disposed within thecabinet 12 or may have thin client capability such as that some of thecomputing capability is maintained at a remote server.

The plurality of player-activated buttons 20 may be used for variousfunctions such as, but not limited to, selecting a wager denomination,selecting a game to be played, selecting a wager amount per game,initiating a game, or cashing out money from gaming machine 10. Buttons20 may be operable as input mechanisms and may include mechanicalbuttons, electromechanical buttons or touch screen buttons. In one ormore embodiments, buttons 20 may be replaced with various other inputmechanisms known in the art such as, but not limited to, touch screens,touch pad, track ball, mouse, switches, toggle switches, voice orgesture based commands or other input means used to accept player input.For example, one input means is as disclosed in U.S. Pub. App.2011/0111853, entitled “Universal Button Module,” filed on Jan. 14, 2011and/or U.S. Pub. App. 2010/0113140 entitled “Gesture Enhanced InputDevice” filed Nov. 16, 2009 which are hereby incorporated by reference.Player input may also be by providing touch screen functionality at theprimary game display 14 and/or secondary display 18.

The primary game display 14 may present a base game of chance wherein aplayer receives one or more outcomes from a set of potential outcomes.For example, one such game of chance is a video slot machine game. Inother aspects of the disclosure, gaming machine 10 may present a videoor mechanical reel slot machine, a video keno game, a lottery game, abingo game, a Class II bingo game, a roulette game, a craps game, ablackjack game, a mechanical or video representation of a wheel game orthe like.

To enable certain features and facilities of the present disclosure adigital camera (not shown) is mounted on the gaming machine 10 at alocation to capture a biometric image of a player seated at the gamingmachine 10 for play. For example, the digital camera may be mountedbetween the speakers 26 or on the PTM 28. The digital camera may beconfigured to capture images in its focal area or to capture images inits focal area when a player is detected at the gaming machine 10.Preferably the focal area for the digital camera is directed to capturethe facial image of the player for the purposes of processing one ormore images to passively approximate the age of the player. Where thedevice is, for example, a mobile device such as a Smart phone or tablet,those devices as well may include a digital camera for capturing thebiometrical image of the user such as their face and eyes.

Referring to FIGS. 2A, B, the gaming device 10 hardware 201 for thecontroller(s) is shown in accordance with one or more embodiments. Thehardware 201 includes base game processor board 203 (EGM ProcessorBoard) connected through serial bus line 205 to game monitoring unit(GMU) 207 (such as a Bally MC300 or ACSC NT manufactured and sold byBally Gaming, Inc., Las Vegas, Nev.). EGM Processor Board 203 isconnected to the player interface device PID 209 over bus line 249 andPID 209 is connected to the iView device such as 211 in FIG. 2A throughbus lines 213, 217, 219, 221, 223. The PID 209 provides forcommunication between one or more gaming devices 10 and the casinosystem such as the type as hereinafter described. Inasmuch as gamingdevices 10 may be manufactured by different entities, mounting like PTMs28, 211 and PIDs 209 at each gaming device 10 provides for communicationto the system in one or more common message protocols. Typically when acasino enterprise purchases a casino management system they alsopurchase the same manufacturer's PTMs 28, 211 and PIDs 209 which arethen installed by the various manufacturers of the gaming devices 10 forthe enterprise before delivery. In this manner the mountings for thePTMs 28, 211 on the gaming devices can be configured for location andesthetic appearance. Gaming voucher ticket printer 36 (for printingplayer cash out tickets) (shown as printer 222 in FIG. 2A) is connectedto PID 209 and GMU 207 over bus lines 227, 229. EGM Processor Board 203,PID 209 and GMU 207 connect to Ethernet switch 231 over bus lines 233,235, 237. Ethernet switch 231 connects to a slot management system and acasino management system (SMS, SDS, CMS and CMP) (FIGS. 4A, 4B) networkover bus line 239. Ethernet switch 231 may also connect to a serverbased gaming server or a downloadable gaming server. GMU 207 also mayconnect to the network over bus line 241. Speakers 26 (shown as 243 inFIG. 2B) to produce sounds related to the game or according to thepresent disclosure connect through audio mixer 242 and bus lines 247,249 to EGM Processor Board 203 and PID 209.

Peripherals 251 connect through bus 253 to EGM Processor Board 203. Theperipherals 251 include, but are not limited to the following and mayinclude individual processing capability: bill/voucher acceptor 24 tovalidate and accept currency and ticket vouchers, the player interfacessuch a buttons 20, primary and secondary game displays 14, 18 and anysecondary or tertiary displays (with/without) touch screenfunctionality, monitors, lights and one or more digital cameras. Theperipherals 251 may include the displays as hereinafter described withreference to the various embodiments of the present disclosure as hereindescribed or their equivalents. For example, the bill/voucher acceptor24 is typically connected to the game input-output board of the EGMprocessing board 203 (which is, in turn, connected to a conventionalcentral processing unit (“CPU”) board), such as an Intel Pentium®microprocessor mounted on a gaming motherboard. The I/O board may beconnected to CPU processor board 203 by a serial connection such asRS-232 or USB or may be attached to the processor by a bus such as, butnot limited to, an ISA bus. The gaming motherboard may be mounted withother conventional components, such as are found on conventionalpersonal computer motherboards, and loaded with a game program which mayinclude a gaming machine operating system (OS), such as a Bally AlphaOS. EGM processor board 203 executes a game program that causes thegaming device 10 to display and play a game. The various components andincluded devices may be installed with conventionally and/orcommercially available components, devices, and circuitry into aconventional and/or commercially available gaming terminal cabinet 12.

When a player has inserted a form of currency such as, for example andwithout limitation, paper currency, coins or tokens, cashless tickets orvouchers, electronic funds transfers or the like into the currencyacceptor, a signal is sent by way of bus 253 to the I/O board and to EGMprocessor board 203 which, in turn, assigns an appropriate number ofcredits for play in accordance with the game program. The player mayfurther control the operation of the gaming machine by way of otherperipherals 251, for example, to select the amount to wager via thebuttons 20. The game starts in response to the player operating a startmechanism such as the handle 34, button 20 such as a SPIN/RESET buttonor a touch screen icon. The game program includes a random numbergenerator to provide a display of randomly selected indicia on one ormore displays such as the primary game display 14 as shown in FIG. 1. Insome embodiments, the random generator may be physically separate fromgaming device 10; for example, it may be part of a central determinationhost system which provides random game outcomes to the game program.Finally, EGM processor board 203 under control of the game program andOS compares the outcome to an award schedule. The set of possible gameoutcomes may include a subset of outcomes related to the triggering andplay of a feature or bonus game. In the event the displayed outcome is amember of this subset, EGM processor board 203, under control of thegame program and by way of I/O Board, may cause feature/bonus game playto be presented on the primary game display 14 and/or any secondarydisplay(s) 18.

Predetermined payout amounts for certain outcomes, including featuregame outcomes, are stored as part of the game program. Such payoutamounts are, in response to instructions from EGM processor board 203,provided to the player in the form of coins, credits or currency via I/Oboard and a pay mechanism, which may be one or more of a credit meter, acoin hopper, a voucher printer, an electronic funds transfer protocol orany other payout means known or developed in the art.

In various embodiments, the game program is stored in a memory device(not shown) connected to or mounted on the gaming motherboard. By way ofexample, but not by limitation, such memory devices include externalmemory devices, hard drives, CD-ROMs, DVDs, and flash memory cards. Inan alternative embodiment, the game programs are stored in a remotestorage device. In an embodiment, the remote storage device is housed ina remote server such as a downloadable gaming server. The gaming machinemay access the remote storage device via a network connection, includingbut not limited to, a local area network connection, a TCP/IPconnection, a wireless connection, or any other means for operativelynetworking components together. Optionally, other data includinggraphics, sound files and other media data for use with the gamingterminal are stored in the same or a separate memory device (not shown).Some or all of the game program and its associated data may be loadedfrom one memory device into another, for example, from flash memory torandom access memory (RAM).

In one or more embodiments, peripherals may be connected to the systemover Ethernet connections directly to the appropriate server or tied tothe system controller inside the gaming terminal using USB, serial orEthernet connections. Each of the respective devices may have upgradesto their firmware utilizing these connections.

GMU 207 includes an integrated circuit board and GMU processor andmemory including coding for network communications, such as the G2S(game-to-system) protocol from the Gaming Standards Association, LasVegas, Nev., used for system communications over the network. As shown,GMU 207 may connect to the card reader 32 (shown as 255 in FIG. 2A)through bus 257 and may thereby obtain player information and transmitthe information over the network through bus 241. Gaming activityinformation may be transferred by the EGM Processor Board 203 to GMU 207where the information may be translated into a network protocol, such asS2S, for transmission to a server, such as a player tracking server,where information about a player's playing activity may be stored in adesignated server database. The GMU 207 may also facilitate retrievingof data from a player account to be provided to the EGM processor board203 for, for example, obtaining data corresponding to the age of aplayer tied to the account.

PID 209 includes an integrated circuit board, PID processor (iView CPU),and memory which includes an operating system, such as Windows CE, aplayer interface program which may be executable by the PID 209processor together with various input/output (I/O) drivers forrespective devices which connect to PID processor and which may furtherinclude various games or game components playable on PTM 28, 211 orplayable on a connected network server and PTM 28, 211 is operable asthe player interface. PID 209 connects to card reader 32 (shown as 255in FIG. 2A) through bus 223, player tracking display 30 (shown as iViewdisplay 229 in FIG. 2A) through video decoder 261 and bus 221, such asan LVDS or VGA bus.

As part of its programming, the PID 209 processor executes coding todrive player tracking display 30, 229 and provide messages andinformation to a player. Touch screen circuitry 263 interactivelyconnects PTM display 30, 229 and video decoder 261 to PTM 28, 211 suchthat a player may input information and causes the information to betransmitted either on the player's initiative or responsive to a query.Additionally soft keys 262 connect through bus 217 to PID 209 andoperate together with the player tracking display 30 to provideinformation or queries to a player and receive responses or queries fromthe player. PID 209, in turn, communicates over the CMS/SMS networkthrough Ethernet switch 231 and busses 235, 239 and with respectiveservers, such as a player tracking server.

PTMs 28 are linked into the virtual private network of the systemcomponents in gaming terminal 10. The system components include theplayer tacking module 28 (e.g. Bally iVIEW® device) (“iView” is aregistered trademark of Bally Gaming, Inc.), PID 209, EGM processingboard 203 and game monitoring unit (GMU) processing board 207. Thesesystem components may connect over a network to the slot managementsystem (such as a commercially available Bally SDS/SMS) and/or casinomanagement system (such as a commercially available Bally CMP/CMS).

The GMU 207 system component has a connection to the base game through aserial SAS connection and is connected to various servers using, forexample, HTTPs over Ethernet. Through this connection, firmware, media,operating system software, gaming machine configurations can bedownloaded to the system components from the servers. This data isauthenticated prior to installation on the system components.

The system components include the PTM 28 processing board (PID 209) andgame monitoring unit (GMU) 207. The GMU 207, PID 209 and PTM 28 can becombined into one like the commercially available Bally GTM iVIEWdevice. This device may have a video mixing technology to mix the EGMprocessor's video signals with the iVIEW display onto the top boxmonitor or any monitor on the gaming device.

The PTM 28 may also interface with a switcher and router device of thetype described above. In such case, instead of providing the PTM display30, the switcher and router device provides for the content normallydisplay at the PTM display 30 to be displayed at one or more of theprimary or secondary displays 14, 18.

The gaming device 10 may also include a graphics processing unit (GPU)290 configured to process the video/graphics content displayed at thegaming device 10 primary and secondary displays 14, 18. According to thepresent disclosure the GPU 290 and/or EGM Processor Board 203 willprocess the video and graphics content to adjust one or more of thecontent brightness, color temperature, vibrancy and/or color shiftaccording to the determined age or approximate age and, in certainembodiments, as further adjusted by detected ambient conditions and asadjusted by the player or as dictated by a default protocol.

In accordance with one or more embodiments, FIG. 3 is a functional blockdiagram of a gaming kernel 300 of a game program under control of gamingdevice EGM processor board 203. The game program uses gaming kernel 300by calling into application programming interface (API) 302, which ispart of game manager 304. The components of game kernel 300 as shown inFIG. 3 are only illustrative, and should not be considered limiting. Forexample, the number of managers may be changed, additional managers maybe added or some managers may be removed without deviating from thescope and spirit of the disclosure.

As shown in the example, there are three layers: a hardware layer 306;an operating system layer 308, such as, but not limited to, Linux; and agame kernel layer having game manager 304 therein. In one or moreembodiments, the use of an operating system layer 310, such a UNIX-basedor Windows-based operating system, allows game developers interfacing tothe gaming kernel to use any of a number of standard development toolsand environments available for the operating systems. This is incontrast to the use of proprietary, low level interfaces which mayrequire significant time and engineering investments for each gameupgrade, hardware upgrade, or feature upgrade. The game kernel 300executes at the user level of the operating system layer 308, and itselfcontains a major component called the I/O board server 315. To properlyset the bounds of game application software (making integrity checkingeasier), all game applications interact with gaming kernel 300 using asingle API 302 in game manager 304. This enables game applications tomake use of a well-defined, consistent interface, as well as makingaccess points to gaming kernel 300 controlled, where overall access iscontrolled using separate processes.

For example, game manager 304 parses an incoming command stream and,when a command dealing with I/O comes in, the command is sent to anapplicable library routine 312. Library routine 312 decides what itneeds from a device, and sends commands to I/O board server 310 (seearrow 308). A few specific drivers remain in operating system layer310's kernel, shown as those below line 306. These are built-in,primitive, or privileged drivers that are (i) general (ii) kept to aminimum and (iii) are easier to leave than extract. In such cases, thelow-level communications is handled within operating system layer 310and the contents passed to library routines 312.

Thus, in a few cases library routines may interact with drivers insideoperating system layer 310, which is why arrow 308 is shown as havingthree directions (between library routines 312 and I/O board server 315,or between library routines 312 and certain drivers in operating systemlayer 306). No matter which path is taken, the logic needed to work witheach device is coded into modules in the user layer of the diagram.Operating board server layer 306 is kept as simple, stripped down, andcommon across as many hardware platforms as possible. The libraryutilities and user-level drivers change as dictated by the game cabinetor game machine in which it will run. Thus, each game cabinet or gamemachine may have an industry standard EGM EGM processing board 203connected to a unique, relatively dumb, and as inexpensive as possibleI/O adapter board, plus a gaming kernel 300 which will have thegame-machine-unique library routines and I/O board server 315 componentsneeded to enable game applications to interact with the gaming machinecabinet. Note that these differences are invisible to the gameapplication software with the exception of certain functionaldifferences (i.e., if a gaming cabinet has stereo sound, the gameapplication will be able make use of API 302 to use the capability overthat of a cabinet having traditional monaural sound).

Game manager 304 provides an interface into game kernel 300, providingconsistent, predictable, and backwards compatible calling methods,syntax, and capabilities by way of game application API 302. Thisenables the game developer to be free of dealing directly with thehardware, including the freedom to not have to deal with low-leveldrivers as well as the freedom to not have to program lower levelmanagers 330, although lower level managers 330 may be accessiblethrough game manager 304's interface if a programmer has the need. Inaddition to the freedom derived from not having to deal with thehardware level drivers and the freedom of having consistent, callable,object-oriented interfaces to software managers of those components(drivers), game manager 304 provides access to a set of high levelmanagers 320 also having the advantages of consistent callable,object-oriented interfaces, and further providing the types and kinds ofbase functionality required in casino-type games. Game manager 304,providing all the advantages of its consistent and richly functionalgame application API 302 as supported by the rest of game kernel 300,thus provides a game developer with a multitude of advantages.

Game manager 304 may have several objects within itself, including aninitialization object (not shown). The initialization object performsthe initialization of the entire game machine, including other objects,after game manager 304 has started its internal objects and servers inappropriate order. In order to carry out this function, the kernel'sconfiguration manager 321 is among the first objects to be started;configuration manager 321 has data needed to initialize and correctlyconfigure other objects or servers.

The high level managers 320 of game kernel 300 may include game eventlog manager 322 which provides, at the least, a logging or logger baseclass, enabling other logging objects to be derived from this baseobject. The logger object is a generic logger; that is, it is not awareof the contents of logged messages and events. The game event logmanager's 322 job is to log events in non-volatile event log space. Thesize of the space may be fixed, although the size of the logged event istypically not. When the event space or log space fills up, oneembodiment will delete the oldest logged event (each logged event willhave a time/date stamp, as well as other needed information such aslength), providing space to record the new event. In this embodiment,the most recent events will thus be found in the log space, regardlessof their relative importance. Further provided is the capability to readthe stored logs for event review.

In accordance with one embodiment, meter manager 323 manages the variousmeters embodied in the game kernel 300. This includes the accountinginformation for the game machine and game play. There are hard meters(counters) and soft meters; the soft meters may be stored innon-volatile storage such as non-volatile battery-backed RAM to preventloss. Further, a backup copy of the soft meters may be stored in aseparate non-volatile storage such as EEPROM. In one embodiment, metermanager 323 receives its initialization data for the meters, duringstart-up, from configuration manager 321. While running, the cash inmanager 324 and cash out manager 325 call the meter manager's 323 updatefunctions to update the meters. Meter manager 323 will, on occasion,create backup copies of the soft meters by storing the soft meters'readings in EEPROM. This is accomplished by calling and using EEPROMmanager 331.

In accordance with still other embodiments, progressive manager 336manages progressive games playable from the game machine. Event manager327 is generic, like game event log manager 327, and is used to managevarious gaming machine events. Focus manager 328 correlates whichprocess has control of various focus items. Tilt manager 332 is anobject that receives a list of errors (if any) from configurationmanager 321 at initialization, and during game play from processes,managers, drivers, etc. that may generate errors. Random numbergenerator manager 329 is provided to allow easy programming access to arandom number generator (RNG), as a RNG is required in virtually allcasino-style (gambling) games. Random number generator manager 329includes the capability of using multiple seeds.

In accordance with one or more embodiments, a credit manager object (notshown) manages the current state of credits (cash value or cashequivalent) in the game machine, including any available winnings, andfurther provides denomination conversion services. Cash out manager 325has the responsibility of configuring and managing monetary outputdevices. During initialization, cash out manager 325, using data fromconfiguration manager 321, sets the cash out devices correctly andselects any selectable cash out denominations. During play, a gameapplication may post a cash out event through the event manager 327 (thesame way all events are handled), and using a call back posted by cashout manager 325, cash out manager 325 is informed of the event. Cash outmanager 325 updates the credit object, updates its state in non-volatilememory, and sends an appropriate control message to the device managerthat corresponds to the dispensing device. As the device dispensesdispensable media, there will typically be event messages being sentback and forth between the device and cash out manager 325 until thedispensing finishes, after which cash out manager 325, having updatedthe credit manager and any other game state (such as some associatedwith meter manager 323) that needs to be updated for this set ofactions, sends a cash out completion event to event manager 327 and tothe game application thereby. Cash in manager 324 functions similarly tocash out manager 325, only controlling, interfacing with, and takingcare of actions associated with cashing in events, cash in devices, andassociated meters and crediting.

In a further example, in accordance with one or more embodiments, I/Oboard server 315 may write data to the gaming machine EEPROM memory,which is located in the gaming machine cabinet and holds meter storagethat must be kept even in the event of power failure. Game manager 304calls the I/O library functions to write data to the EEPROM. The I/Oboard server 315 receives the request and starts a low priority EEPROMmanager 331 thread within I/O board server 315 to write the data. Thisthread uses a sequence of 8 bit command and data writes to the EEPROMdevice to write the appropriate data in the proper location within thedevice. Any errors detected will be sent as IPC messages to game manager304. All of this processing is asynchronous.

In accordance with one embodiment, button module 317 within I/O boardserver 315, polls (or is sent) the state of buttons every 2 ms. Theseinputs are debounced by keeping a history of input samples. Certainsequences of samples are required to detect a button was pressed, inwhich case the I/O board server 315 sends an inter-process communicationevent to game manager 304 that a button was pressed or released. In someembodiments, the gaming machine may have intelligent distributed I/Owhich debounces the buttons, in which case button module 317 may be ableto communicate with the remote intelligent button processor to get thebutton events and simply relay them to game manager 304 via IPCmessages. In still another embodiment, the I/O library may be used forpay out requests from the game application. For example, hopper module318 must start the hopper motor, constantly monitor the coin sensinglines of the hopper, debounce them, and send an IPC message to the gamemanager 304 when each coin is paid.

Further details, including disclosure of lower level fault handlingand/or processing, are included in U.S. Pat. No. 7,351,151 issued Apr.1, 2008 entitled “Gaming Board Set and Gaming Kernel for Game Cabinets”the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by explicit reference.

Referring to FIGS. 4A and B, an example of a gaming enterprise system801 is shown in accordance with one or more embodiments. Gamingenterprise system 801 may include one casino or multiple locations(herein referred to collectively as a casino enterprise) and generallyincludes a network of gaming terminals 803 (including gaming devices 10of the type as described in FIG. 1), floor management system (SMS) 805,and casino management system (CMS) 807. SMS 805 may include loadbalancer 811, network services server 813, player tracking module 28,iView (PTM 28), content servers 815, certificate services server 817,floor radio dispatch receiver/transmitters (RDC) 819, floor transactionservers 821 and game engines 823 (where the gaming terminals 803 operateserver based, server supported or downloadable games), each of which mayconnect over network bus 825 to gaming terminals 803. CMS 807 mayinclude location tracking server 831, WRG RTCEM (William Ryan Group RealTime Customer Experience Management from William Ryan Group, Inc. of SeaGirt, N.J.) server 833, data warehouse server 835, player trackingserver 837, biometric server 839, analysis services server 841, thirdparty interface server 843, slot accounting server 845, floor accountingserver 847, progressives server 849, promo control server 851, bonusgame (such as Bally Live Rewards) server 853, download control server855, player history database 857, configuration management server 859,browser manager 861, tournament engine server 863 connecting through bus865 to server host 867 and gaming terminals 803. The various servers andgaming terminals 803 may connect to the network with variousconventional network connections (such as, for example, USB, serial,parallel, RS485, Ethernet). Additional servers which may be incorporatedwith CMS 807 include a responsible gaming limit server (not shown),advertisement server (not shown), and a control station server (notshown) where an operator or authorized personnel may select options andinput new programming to adjust each of the respective servers andgaming terminals 803. SMS 805 may also have additional servers includinga control station (not shown) through which authorized personnel mayselect options, modify programming, and obtain reports of the connectedservers and devices, and obtain reports. The various CMS and SMS serversare descriptively entitled to reflect the functional executableprogramming stored thereon and the nature of databases maintained andutilized in performing their respective functions. One or more of theservers may control signage 862 in the venue to display various messagesand information to the players.

The gaming terminals 803 include various peripheral components that maybe connected with USB, serial, parallel, RS-485 or Ethernetdevices/architectures to the system components within the respectivegaming machine. The GMU (shown as GMU 206 in FIG. 2A) has a connectionto the base game through a serial SAS connection. The system componentsin the gaming cabinet may be connected to the servers using HTTPs or G2Sprotocols over Ethernet. Using CMS 807 and/or SMS 805 servers anddevices, firmware, media, operating systems, and configurations may bedownloaded to the system components of respective gaming devices forupgrading or managing floor content and offerings in accordance withoperator selections or automatically depending upon CMS 807 and SMS 805master programming. The data and programming updates to gaming terminals803 are authenticated using conventional techniques prior to install onthe system components.

In various embodiments, any of the gaming devices 803 may be a videoslot machine, video poker machine, video Bingo machine, video Kenomachine, or a gaming device offering one or more of the above describedgames. Alternately, gaming devices 803 may provide a game with anaccumulation-style feature game as one of a set of multiple primarygames selected for play by a random number generator, as describedabove. A gaming enterprise system 801 of the type described above alsoallows a plurality of games in accordance with the various embodimentsof the disclosure to be linked under the control of a group game server(not shown) for cooperative or competitive play in a particular area,bank of games, casino or between casinos located in geographicallyseparate areas. For example, one or more examples of group games undercontrol of a group game server are disclosed in Vallejo et al U.S.Published Application 2008/0139305, entitled “Networked System andMethod for Group Gaming,” filed on Nov. 9, 2007, which is herebyincorporated by reference in its entirety for all purposes.

The gaming enterprise system 801, among other functionalities such asslot accounting (i.e. monitoring the amount wagered (“drop”), awardspaid) and other casino services, includes the player tracking CMS/CMPserver 837 and/or data warehouse 835 storing player account data. Thisdata includes personal data for players enrolled in the casino playersclub sometimes referred to as a loyalty club. An example of the personaldata is the player's name, address, SSN, birth date, spouse's name andperhaps personal preferences such as types of games, preferencesregarding promotions, player rating level, available player comp points(points accumulated based upon commercial “spend” activity with theenterprise including gaming and which may be redeemed or converted intocash or merchandise) and the like. As is known in the industry andaccording to the prior art, at enrollment the player is assigned acreated account in the player tracking CMS/CMP server 837 and is issueda player tracking card having a machine readable magnetic stripe. Duringenrollment a player would provide their demographic informationincluding their data of birth. Additionally or alternatively the playerwould provide an identification instrument such as a driver's licensewhich also includes the player's date of birth.

When a player plays a gaming device 10 (or terminal 803) (hereinaftercollectively referred to as gaming devices 10), he/she inserts theirplayer tracking card into the card reader 32 (FIG. 1) which communicatesdata to the CMS/CMP server 837 to accumulate loyalty (“comp”) pointsbased upon the wagers/wins of the player. For example, a player mayaccumulate one comp point for each $5 wagered. Comp points may also beawarded as part of a promotion and for other commercial activity such asthe purchase of goods or services. Insertion of the player card alsoprovides access to the player's account data including age informationfor the purposes of the present disclosure.

The system 801 may also include electronic transfer of fundsfunctionality. For example, a player having accumulated $100 at a gamingterminal 10 may decide to “cash out” to play another gaming terminal 10.The player, for example using the PTM 28 to initiate communication withthe system 801 for example server 837 to upload the value from thegaming terminal 10 into an electronic account associated with theplayer's account. The player may choose to upload all or a portion ofthe funds the player's established electronic account. The system wouldprompt the player to enter their PIN (or obtain biometrical confirmationas to the player's identity) and upload the chosen amount to theiraccount. When the player moves to another gaming terminal 10 he/sheinserts their player loyalty card into the card reader 32 to accesstheir account. A prompt provides for the player to request funds fromtheir account. Entering their PIN (or biometric identifier) the playercan input the desired amount which is downloaded to their gamingterminal 10 for play.

All or portions of the present disclosure may be implemented or promotedby or through a system as suggested in FIG. 5. At 801 is the gamingenterprise system which may be hosted at a casino property enterprise,across several casino enterprises or by a third party host. As describedabove the gaming enterprise system 801 has a network communication bus865 providing for communication between the gaming devices 10 andvarious servers as described above with respect to FIGS. 4A,B. Toprovide the functionality illustrated in FIG. 5, a feature server 500,such as a Bally Elite Bonusing Server, is connected to the networkcommunication bus 865 for communication to the gaming enterprise system801, the gaming devices 10 and the various servers and other devices asdescribed above. Through a secure network firewall 502 the featureserver 500 is in communication with a cloud computing/storage service514 which may be hosted by the casino enterprise, a licensed third partyor if permitted by gaming regulators an unlicensed provider. For examplethe cloud service 514 may be as provided by Microsoft® Private CloudSolutions offered by Microsoft Corp. of Redmond, Wash., USA. The cloudservice 514 provides various applications which can be accessed anddelivered to, for example, personal computers 506, portable computingdevices such as computer tablets 508, personal digital assistants (PDAs)510 and cellular devices such as telephones and smart phones 512. Forexample the cloud service 514 may provide and support the enterpriseapplications in association with the feature server 500. The cloudservice 514 may also facilitate the delivery of downloadable softwareapplications and content to user/players by supporting updates andadvertising through the enterprise applications to the remote deviceuser/player. The cloud service 514 includes security provide for securecommunication with the cloud service 514 between the player/users andthe cloud service 514 and between the cloud service 514 and the gamingenterprise system 501. Security applications may be through encryption,the use of personal identification numbers (PINS), biometricidentification, location determination or other devices and systems. Assuggested in FIG. 5 the cloud service 515 stores or accesses player/userdata retrieved from players/users and from the gaming enterprise system501 and feature server 500.

The players/users may access the cloud service 514 and the applicationsand data provided thereby through the Internet or through broadbandwireless cellular communication systems and any intervening sort rangewireless communication such as WiFi. The players/users may access theapplications and data through various social media offerings such asFacebook, Twitter, Yelp, MySpace or LinkedIn or the like.

As but an example, a player/user may have a player account with a casinoenterprise. That account may include data such as the player's creditlevel, their rating, demographic information including age and theiravailable comps. At their smart phone 512 the player/user sends arequest to the cloud service 514 (perhaps through a previouslydownloaded application) to request a the status of their available compssuch as how many comp points they have and what may be available throughredemption of those points (e.g. lodging, cash back, meals ormerchandise). The application for the request may present casinopromotions, graphics or other advertising to the player/user. Theapplication, to support such a request, would typically require theplayer/user to enter a PIN or some other unique identifier such as abiometric identifier or tag. The cloud service 514 forwards the inquiryto the feature server 500 which, in turn, confirms the identificationand retrieves the requested information from the data warehouse 835 orplayer history database 857 or player tracking CMS/CMP server 837. Theinformation is formatted by the cloud service 514 application anddelivered to the player/user. The delivery may be formatted based uponthe player/user's device operating system (OS), display size or thelike.

The cloud service 514 may also host game applications to provide virtualinstances of games for free, promotional, or where permitted, P2P (Payto Play) supported gaming Third party developers may also have access toplacing applications with the cloud service 514 through, for example anational operations center (Bally NOC 504). A game software manufacturersuch as Bally Gaming, Inc. may also provide game applications on its ownor on behalf of the casino enterprise.

Other media such as advertising, notices (such as an upcomingtournament) promotions and surveys may also be provided to and throughthe cloud service 514. When a player/user accesses the cloud service 514certain media may be delivered to the player/user in a manner formattedfor their application and device.

The cloud service 514 enables the casino enterprise to market to andfoster player loyalty. To drive such interaction various incentiveprograms may be employed including, as described above, users earning orbeing awarded mystery game chances which may be redeemed at their nextvisit to the casino enterprise or, where permitted, during play on theirremote devices.

The gaming devices 10 may also be configured to support server-based orserver supported gaming. In such instances some or all of the gamingprocessing would take place at a server with the local gaming device 10being a terminal to provide the graphic displays and accept the player'sinput.

In an embodiment of the present disclosure as applied to the gamingenvironment, referring to FIG. 6 at 600 the gaming device 10 is startedsuch as by the booting-up the gaming device 10. At 602 one or more ofthe GPU 290 and EGM Processor Board 203 set the color shift to a defaultcondition such as a condition where little or no adjustment to thebrightness, or color shift applied to the original content and at 604sets the vibrancy to high. In a default condition vibrancy is set tohigh to attract passersby to play the gaming device 10. In analternative or additional embodiment all of the brightness, color shiftand vibrancy are as dictated by the original content. It should beunderstood that continuous presentation at high vibrancy may be applied;however it is believed to be disadvantageous to continuously use highvibrancy inasmuch as the same may cause eye strain and fatigue. At 606the gaming device 10 waits for detection of a player. At step 608 afacility at the gaming device 10 (or system) detects the presence of aplayer and determines the player's demographic, i.e. player's age. Thefacility may be a digital camera detecting the presence of a player atthe gaming device 10, the player inserting cash or a voucher/ticket atthe validator 24 or the player inserting their issued loyalty card intothe card reader 32.

The determination of at least the player's approximate age can bedetermined by the facility by various techniques. One technique, wherethe player has used their loyalty card (or other instrument such as awireless fob), is to access the player tracking server 837 and datawarehouse 835 to access the player's account and retrieve datarepresenting the player's age. Another technique is for the gamingdevice 10 and/or system 801 to identify the player and access anexternal source such as a credit card database, frequent flyer carddatabase or the like. This technique may require the player to swipetheir credit card or provide identifying data. Another technique for thefacility is for the player, at the gaming device 10, to offer upidentification instrument such s a driver's license or passport forscanning such as by the digital camera or optical reader. Yet anothertechnique is to passively capture a biometric image of the player by thedigital camera for processing the data to at least estimate the player'sage. As set forth above this technique may include obtaining one or moredigital images of the player's face and processing those imagesaccording to software such as the SHORE™ software product fromFraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, Am Wolfsmantel 33, 91058,Erlangen, Germany from which the age of a subject can be estimated basedupon a captured image of the subject's face and eyes. This technology istouted as being able to estimate the age with a mean absolute error of6.85 years. One or more other biometric software analytical products maybe used to produce comparable results. Yet another technique is torequest the player input their age at the gaming device 10 and/or PTM 28or request that the player select their age group, e.g. 21-35, 36-50, 51and over.

Based upon the data representing at least the approximate age of theplayer at 610 one or more of the vibrancy, brightness and color shiftfor the displayed content is adjusted. For performance reasons thesetting of color shift and vibrancy would be done by pixel shaders onthe GPU 290. The reason for this is by use of languages such as OpenCLor CUDA, many pixels could be adjusted in parallel. It can be seen thateach pixel would have no dependencies on other pixels, so thisadjustment would be highly suitable for SIMD or VLIW architectures foundin modern graphics cards. To perform a color shift, one possible methodwould be to convert each pixel into CIE 1931 (International Commissionon Illumination) color space(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIE_1931_color_space), increase the Zvalue by a selected factor and then convert the pixel back into RGB(red-green-blue) space for rendering. Assuming the content had beendesigned with Adobe RGB (1998) working space, conversion to (X, Y, Z)space would be performed by the following matrix (taken fromhttp://www.brucelindbloom.com/index.html?Eqn_RGB_XYZ_Matrix.html).

$\begin{pmatrix}X \\Y \\Z\end{pmatrix} = {\begin{pmatrix}0.5767309 & 0.1655540 & 0.1881852 \\0.2973769 & 0.6273491 & 0.0752741 \\0.0270343 & 0.0706872 & 0.9911085\end{pmatrix}\begin{pmatrix}R \\G \\B\end{pmatrix}}$As can be seen by the third row of the matrix, the Z value is quiteapproximate to blue, but Z is in fact proportional to the shortwavelength sensitivity (S) of the cone cells of the eyes. Thus,according to Berman, increasing this value increases perception ofbrightness, which reduces pupil size and in turn increases resolution ofcontrast, depth of field and acuity.

After Z is increased by a suitable factor (how this factor is determinedwill be described below) the (X, Y, Z) values are transformed back intoRGB values by the following inverse matrix:

$\begin{pmatrix}R \\G \\B\end{pmatrix} = {\begin{pmatrix}2.0413690 & {- 0.5649464} & {- 0.3446944} \\{- 0.9692660} & 1.6760106 & 0.0415560 \\0.0134474 & {- 0.1183897} & 1.0154096\end{pmatrix}\begin{pmatrix}X \\Y \\Z\end{pmatrix}}$

Another step before and after these transformations would be necessaryif the pixel (R, G, B) values were in the range of (0 . . . 255) ratherthan (0 . . . 1.0) which would be to appropriately scale the values byfirst dividing by 255 before the first transformation and multiplying by255 after the second transformation.

To perform a vibrancy adjustment the technology supplied by eeColorcould be used. In broad terms this would work similar to the color shiftmethod, except that a transformation into HSV color space would takeplace, the S parameter would be increased according to a non-linearscale function or look up table, then the HSV value would be transformedback into RGB values. The non-linear scale function would be such thatabove certain levels of saturation little or no increase was made.

Once a player has begun playing, which can be determined by cash-in,card-in or facial presence detection, optimally the player agedemographic is determined by methods described above. This estimation oraccurate identification of age is used to determine the amount of targetcolor shift. A suitable color shift may be used by taking the age of theplayer and putting it into a function, along with a maximum color shift,minimum color shift, and minimum age (presumably 21 in US legaljurisdictions). It had been previously thought that color shifts in alinear fashion as age increases, but more recent research such as shownthat after the age of 60 (see Porkony, reference above) the rateincreases almost threefold. Porkony also describes a lens opticaldensity function for both between ages of 20 and 60, and for over theage of 60. These functions can be used to compute the target colorshift, preferably in combination with the use of suitable focus groupsof different age groups to fine tune values. In the preferredimplementation the target vibrancy is zero, to bring colors back to the‘as-designed’ state for long-term play. At this point of the gamingdevice will smoothly adjust the both the brightness, color shift andvibrancy to the target values. This smoothness can be achieved byinterpolating over a period of time (for example, 2 minutes) between theinitial color shift/vibrancy values and the final target values. Theeffect to the player would be expected to be so subtle as to beunnoticeable. Without the interpolation step the change may be todisconcerting, so this is an important feature of the disclosure.

As an alternative to interpolation, the player may be presented with oneor more user interface buttons or stored preference to enable or disable“enhanced color”. The effect of this button when pressed (or if, forexample a touch screen slide button, moved) would be to set vibrancyand/or color shift to either target values or default values.Importantly, while this button would appear to perform the same functionfor all players, the target values of color shift would be set by agedemographic and would the result of pressing this button would vary fromplayer to player. For example, in FIG. 9 there is shown some examples oftouch screen slider buttons 900, 902, 904 by which the user may adjustthe color shift, brightness and vibrancy.

Another value that may be used to affect brightness, vibrancy and colorshift would be the ambient lighting of the casino. As noted by Bermanabove, a lower light environment causes greater pupil size and thusreduced visual performance of the eye. By reading the ambient lightusing the camera, and adjusting such that lower ambient light leads toan increased color shift, a better, more easier to read display ofgaming content may be achieved.

While gaming machines generally stay in one location and ambientlighting thus does not change much, it can be seen that if thisdisclosure were to be implemented on a mobile device, dynamicallyadjusting color shift and vibrancy to take into account the constantchange of lighting conditions in real time would be possible.

Where a digital camera is provided at the gaming device 10 the settingof the one or more of vibrancy, color shift and brightness may also takeinto account the ambient lighting surrounding the player. For example,if the player and gaming device 10 are in a darkened area of a casinothe settings may be attenuated whereas if the ambient lighting is brightthese settings may be enhanced. Vibrancy is used to brighten the hue ofone or more certain colors. As discussed above as humans mature andtheir eye lenses increase in density and because the lens therebyabsorbs more strongly in the UV and short-wavelength region this leadsto less discrimination between blue and green colors. Hence the GPU 290and/or EGM Processor Board 203, where the player is determined to beolder, would enhance the vibrancy of the blues and greens for a betterpresentation of the content to the player. Software for enhancingvibrancy is available from eeColor and others. By providing a colorshift, in an embodiment, where the player is determined to be elderly,the colors may be shifted toward the longer wavelength (“reds”) toaccount for a red shift phenomenon attributed, as discussed above, to agreater loss of sensitivity of shorter wavelengths at photoreceptors(cones) in the retina with age. Again brightness can be adjusted as wellto brighten the colors (as adjusted) for elderly players and/or wherethe environment is well lit.

Continuing with FIG. 6, at 612 interpolates the characteristics of oneor more of vibrancy, color and brightness based upon any adjustmentssuch as where the digital camera and age determination software adjuststhe age. Adjustments can also be made, as discussed above, based uponchanges in the environment lighting.

A determination is made at 614 as to whether the player is still presentat the gaming device 10. If no player is detected the GPU 209 and/or EGMProcessor Board 203 returns to a default condition of the settings ofbrightness, color shift and vibrancy at 602. Absence of the player maybe determined by the credits of the gaming device 10 being at “0” for aperiod of time, the player cashing out from the gaming machine 10 and noplay prompted for a period of time and/or the player removing theirplayer loyalty card from the card reader 32. Presence or absence mayalso be determined, where provided, by the camera. Preferably camera maycapture images at least periodically to determine player presence aswell as to update the image used for age determination. The process maybe iterative repeatedly making the age determination and applying anyadjustments. Where a player has overridden the adjustments theiterations may be suspended until a new player is detected. Further aplayer's adjusted settings may be stored in an account associated withthe player such as their loyalty account for future reference and/orapplication to other gaming devices 10. If the player is deemed to bestill present the iterative process continues at 616 to adjust thesettings of brightness, color shift and vibrancy. At 618 the processcontinues to test to determine if the player is present and if not toreturn the settings to a default mode. If the player is still presentthe iterative process continues (unless overridden by the player).

The default or “neutral” settings for the brightness, vibrancy and colorshift settings may include a plurality of settings. For example, whereit is determined that no player is present for a period of time, thesettings may be placed in the attract mode to highlight vibrancy andbrightness. The default settings may be based upon different detectedambient conditions as well. A motion detector (or the digital camera)may also detect when players are in the vicinity of the gaming machineand if so shift to a high vibrancy and brightness and if not scale backthose settings.

The default settings and adjustments to the at least one of thebrightness, color shift and vibrancy may be controlled by the EGMprocessor board 203 or by a separate graphics processor unit 290 whichmay be original equipment or an aftermarket add-on.

For embodiments which include both a digital camera and the player usesa loyalty card, both age determination techniques can be used and anydiscrepancy resolved according to predefined rules. For example, aloyalty card may indicate that the player is twenty-four whereas thebiometric data from the facial image captured by the camera indicatesthat the player is sixty-five. This “conflict” may be due to error ormay be due to the player using someone else's player loyalty card. Theconflict resolution rules may apply the biometrically determine age foradjustment of the content presentation.

FIG. 7 shows another process for the preset disclosure where sources canbe accessed to determine the player's age as well as using the digitalcamera and image processing software. At 700 the GPU 209 and/or EGMProcessor Board 203 assume a default settings condition of brightness,color shift and vibrancy as described above. A data structure 702 storesone or more default settings and the protocols for applying the settingsas suggested above. The process includes at 704 detecting the presenceof a player and at least an approximate age. This process step mayinclude retrieving data from a player account database 706 and/orreceiving and processing, in the manner described above, a digital imageof the player captured by a digital camera peripheral 708. In anembodiment a likely demographic associated with the content can also beused to apply an adjustment. For example, if the content is more likelyto be viewed by an older demographic, then an adjustment can be applied.Applying the “likely demographic” determination may be applicable wherethe user's age cannot be actively pr passively determined Oneenvironment for such an application may be in cable or broadcasttelevision programming of older color programming more likely to beviewed by older people. If no player is detected or an approximate agecannot be determined the process retains the default setting. At 710 theprocess may also include a determination of changes to the ambientlighting conditions at the display and player. This may be done by thedigital camera peripheral step 708 or a lighting setting may be encodedand fixed when the gaming device 10 is installed. If there is no changein ambient lighting conditions and not player is detected the processreturns to the default, neutral settings at 700. If at 704 a player isdetected and their at least approximate age is determined, at 712 theadjustment of one or more of brightness, vibrancy and color shift isapplied. It should be noted that the determination of the player's agemay result in retention of the default setting if the age determinationresults in no adjustment. Further, if the ambient lighting conditionshave changed, this too may result in an adjustment of one or more ofbrightness and vibrancy of the display. Where there is a conflictbetween adjustments as a result of the player's age and ambientconditions rules for resolution may be adopted such as giving primacy tothe adjustments based upon age. Look-up table may be established todetermine the adjustments based upon player age, ambient conditions andother factors such as the content. For example, if the content is avideo recording, no adjustment may be applied to preserve the originalimpression of the video and minimize processing delays.

At 714 the content altered by the adjustments of one or more ofbrightness, vibrancy or color shift is delivered to the display forpresentation to the player through the GPU 290 and/or EGM processorBoard 203. The object of applying these adjustments is to enhance theviewing of the content to the player. In an embodiment the gaming device10 may be provided with one or more buttons or touch screen controls forthe player to override the adjustment(s) or modify the adjustments tothe player's liking at 716 as described above. For example sliderbuttons 900, 902, 904 (FIG. 9) may be displayed at the primary display14 which can be manipulated by the player to increase/decreasebrightness, vibrancy and/or color shift. In an embodiment where theplayer is using a loyalty card the adjustments may be saved in theplayer's file to be applied in the future to other gaming devices 10.

FIG. 8 shows an embodiment of the present disclosure where contentdelivered to a remote, portable device 800 such as a smart phone, tabletcomputer, personal computer or other such device. The portable devicehas a display 802 as is known in the art. The portable device 800 may beequipped with a digital camera 804 directed toward the user as is alsoknown in the art.

A media/video content source 806 is a repository for streaming contentor downloadable content such as applications, games, graphics or thelike. The user of the portable device 800, through a network 808 such asthe Internet or broadband communications makes communication with thesource 806 and requests content, for example, a game. The portabledevice 800 or the source 806 engages an application facility todetermine at least an approximate age of the user. This may be done byaccessing the user's account database 810 which includes data such asthe user's birth date from which their current age can be determined.The account database 810 may be the user's broadband account or a creditcard or other account or may be stored in a memory associated with thedevice or network. Additionally or alternatively the user may use thecamera 804 (or the portable device 800 may be controlled by a downloadedapplication) to take an image of the user's face. Using one or both ofthe techniques of accessing the user's data or captured biometricinformation or based upon an age input from the user in response to aprompt (“How old are you?”) the portable device 800 and/or the source806 applies the adjustment, if required, to one or more of brightness,vibrancy or color shift to better preset the content to the user. Asabove, the user may have adjustment overrides through touch screen orelectro-mechanical buttons. Further as described above ambientconditions may be taken into account to make the adjustment. The ambientconditions may be acquired by the camera 804. Further the application ofthe adjustment may be configured by the application to be smoothlyapplied over time so that the user is not startled by the adjustment.

The foregoing description, for purposes of explanation, uses specificnomenclature and formula to provide a thorough understanding of thedisclosure. It should be apparent to those of skill in the art that thespecific details are not required in order to practice the disclosure.The embodiments have been chosen and described to best explain theprinciples of the disclosure and its practical application, therebyenabling others of skill in the art to utilize the disclosure, andvarious embodiments with various modifications as are suited to theparticular use contemplated. Thus, the foregoing disclosure is notintended to be exhaustive or to limit the disclosure to the preciseforms disclosed, and those of skill in the art recognize that manymodifications and variations are possible in view of the aboveteachings.

We claim:
 1. An apparatus with a video display for displaying videocontent to a user, the apparatus comprising: a processor that isconfigured to execute instructions from a memory that cause theprocessor to: receive age data of at least an approximate age of theuser from a facility; receive, via a digital camera, ambient light leveldata; adjust brightness, vibrancy, and color shift for the video contentdisplayed at the video display based upon the at least approximate ageof the user, wherein the vibrancy and color shift are adjusted usingpixel shaders on a graphics processing unit; and adjust the brightness,the vibrancy, and the color shift for the video content displayed at thevideo display based upon ambient light data, wherein lower ambient lightlevel results in an increased color shift and vibrancy.
 2. The apparatusof claim 1, wherein the facility is a camera disposed to provide imagedata corresponding to the capture a facial image of the user and theprocessor is configured for determining the age data from the facialimage data.
 3. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a controllerfor a user to control the processor to adjust at least one of thebrightness, the vibrancy and a color shift for the content displayed atthe video display.
 4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the facilityincludes an interface for retrieval of the age data from a datastructure storing the age data.
 5. The apparatus of claim 1, furthercomprising a memory device storing one or more default settings for atleast one of the brightness, the vibrancy and a color shift andconditions at which the default settings are applied.
 6. The apparatusof claim 1, wherein a memory device storing one or more default settingsfor at least one of the brightness, the vibrancy and a color shift andconditions at which the default settings are applied, the processorconfigured to adjust one or more of the brightness, the vibrancy, andthe color shift for the video content displayed at the video displayfrom the default setting to a condition based upon at least theapproximate age of the user over time.
 7. A method for displaying videocontent at a video display to a user, the method comprising: receivingage data of at least an approximate age of the user from a facility;receiving, via a digital camera, ambient light level data; adjusting,via a processor, brightness, vibrancy, and color shift for the videocontent displayed at the video display based upon the at leastapproximate age of the user, wherein the vibrancy and color shift areadjusted using pixel shaders on a graphics processing unit; andadjusting the brightness, the vibrancy, and the color shift for thevideo content displayed at the video display based upon ambient lightdata, wherein lower ambient light level results in an increased colorshift and vibrancy.
 8. The method of claim 7, further comprising:capturing facial image data of the user; and processing at the processorthe facial image data for deriving the data of at least the approximateage of the user.
 9. The method of claim 7, further comprising: applyinga default condition to the display of the brightness, the vibrancy, andthe color shift; and invoking an adjustment to the at least one of thebrightness, the vibrancy, and the color shift based upon at least theapproximate age of the user over time.
 10. A system for adjustingbrightness, vibrancy, and color shift for video content displayed at avideo display to the user based upon the user's at least approximateage, the system comprising: a processor that is configured to executeinstructions from a memory that cause the processor to: derive age dataof at least an approximate age of the user from a facility; receive, viaa digital camera, ambient light level data; adjust the brightness,vibrancy, and color shift for the video content displayed at the videodisplay based upon the at least approximate age of the user, wherein thevibrancy and color shift are adjusted using pixel shaders on a graphicsprocessing unit; and adjust the brightness, the vibrancy, and the colorshift for the video content displayed at the video display based uponambient light data, wherein lower ambient light level results in anincreased color shift and vibrancy.
 11. The system of claim 10, whereinthe facility is a camera disposed to capture a facial image of the userand for determining the at least the approximate age of the user fromthe facial image.
 12. The system of claim 10, wherein the facilityincludes an interface to a data structure to retrieve user data at thedata structure including data representing the at least approximate ageof the user.
 13. The system of claim 10, wherein the video display is agaming device video display that is associated with a data structurethat includes at least one of a player loyalty data structure and acredit card data structure.
 14. The system of claim 10, furthercomprising a memory device storing one or more default settings for atleast one of the brightness, the vibrancy, and a color shift andconditions at which the default settings are applied.
 15. An apparatuswith a video display for displaying video content to a user, theapparatus comprising: a processor that is configured to executeinstructions from a memory that cause the processor to: determine anapproximate age of the user; determine an approximate viewer agedemographic for the video content; receive, via a digital camera,ambient light level data; adjust brightness, vibrancy, and color shiftfor the video content displayed at the video display based upon the atleast approximate age of the user, wherein the vibrancy and color shiftare adjusted using pixel shaders on a graphics processing unit; andadjust the brightness, the vibrancy, and the color shift for the videocontent displayed at the video display based upon ambient light data,wherein lower ambient light level results in an increased color shiftand vibrancy.
 16. The apparatus of claim 15, further comprising a memorydevice storing one or more default settings for at least one of thebrightness, the vibrancy and a color shift and conditions at whichdefault settings are applied.
 17. A mobile device including softwaredownloadable over a communication network to controllers adapted todisplay video content, the mobile device comprising: a processor that isconfigured to execute instructions from a memory that cause theprocessor to: receive age data of at least an approximate age of theuser; receive, via a digital camera, ambient light level data; adjustbrightness, vibrancy, and color shift for the video content displayed atthe video display based upon the at least approximate age of the user,wherein the vibrancy and color shift are adjusted using pixel shaders ona graphics processing unit; and dynamically adjust the brightness, thevibrancy, and the color shift for the video content displayed at thevideo display based upon ambient light data in real time in response tomovement by the mobile device between areas with differing ambient lightlevels, wherein lower ambient light level results in an increased colorshift and vibrancy.
 18. The mobile device of claim 17, wherein theprocessor is further configured to (i) access a database storing thedata, (ii) access and process a facial image of the user to derive thedata, or (iii) receive an input by the user representing the data. 19.The mobile device of claim 17, further comprising instructions to storein a memory at the mobile device, data representing default settings forat least one of the brightness, the vibrancy, and a color shift andconditions at which the default settings are applied.